The PGA Tour is changing its financial structure to help emerging players get paid.
In a memo sent to players on Tuesday morning – and was first reported by The Golf Channel Brentley Romine — The PGA Tour announced two new financial initiatives for its Korn Ferry Tour Fully Exempt Members and Former PGA Tour Fully Exempt Members intended to help ease the financial burden of life as an aspiring PGA Tour professional.
Both initiatives — called the Member Support Program and the Pathways Player Achievement Grant — provide a financial safety net for professionals who compete full-time within the PGA Tour system.
The so-called “Member Support Program” is the more important of the two programs, offering a $150,000 “win guarantee” to players ranked below No. 126 on last season’s FedEx Cup points list. To be eligible to receive the stipend, players must compete in 12 events between the PGA and Korn Ferry Tours throughout the season.
It’s helpful to think of “earnings insurance” simply as a guaranteed base salary of $150,000 paid to all players either through tournament checks or after the completion of the PGA and Korn Ferry Tour seasons. For those who earn more than $150,000 in a season, “earnings insurance” is a moot point: they receive the money in the form of tournament checks as their season progresses. But, for the relatively rare player who it doesn’t earn more than $150,000, the balance of the $150,000 “earnings insurance” is paid out at the end of the season, effectively providing a compensation “floor” for players fighting for their competitive future.
The second program, the Pathways Player Achievement Grant, is effectively a $15,000 stipend for Korn Ferry Tour players. The grant, which will be available to players on the Korn Ferry Tour and top performers in the PGA Tour Americas and PGA Tour University programs, does not come with an event designation and can be used for any expense, either as compensation or to cover player expenses such as travel and hotels.
Both programs represent an expansion of the PGA Tour’s development efforts in an increasingly fragmented pro golf landscape, helping to strengthen the Tour’s development path against outside competition from the LIV, Asian Tour and DP World Tour. They are similar to compensation efforts starting from the Tour in 2022which provided a similar “salary floor” for competitors in the grand tournament and expanded stipend efforts to help with travel costs. According to Romine, the PGA Tour’s policy board cited the importance of the PGA Tour’s strong developmental pathways as a key reason for the new programs.
The changes approved by the PGA Tour’s policy board Thursday come in the same offseason as changes to make the PGA Tour dream even more elusive. In 2026, the Tour will have just 100 “cards” available for the first time, down from the traditional 125, a competitive change that has far-reaching implications for those chasing a coveted spot on the major tour.
These changes have come with much criticism from some corners of the pro game, particularly those on the fringes of the PGA Tour who may be sensitive to purse sizes or the wider competitive opportunities offered at other major tournaments.
